A typical electrical meter center includes a cabinet or enclosure having a plurality of meter socket assemblies. Each meter socket assembly includes a plate member to which the various components of the socket assembly are secured. Electrical power is supplied to the meter center by feeder buses. Feeder buses, which typically consist of three phase buses and a neutral, are electrically connected to the utility lines and typically extend horizontally from the cabinet or enclosure. Multiple (two or three) vertical supply buses are also electrically connected to the feeder buses within the enclosure or cabinet. Each meter socket assembly mounts a meter for each tenant circuit and electrically connects the meter to the feeder buses and the supply buses. Typically, the electrical connections between the meter and socket assembly are made by plug-in jaws which engage corresponding blade-like stabs or meter blade connectors on the meter. The use of the plug-in jaws within the meter socket and the corresponding blade-like stabs or meter blade connectors on the back of the meter permits the meter to be removed from the socket when servicing or replacement of the meter is desired.
Socket type electrical watt-hour meters are used to measure and indicate the amount of electrical power consumption in a residence, industry or business. Typically, a socket type watt-hour meter plugs into a meter socket using the blade-like stab or meter blade connector located on the watt-hour meter. The meter socket itself is mounted inside a meter base or a panel.
When the line power is delivered from a 3 phase wire system, a 5th jaw is used to calculate electrical angle. This is used to correct electrical power consumption factor for correctly metering electrical power consumption. Generally, as serving its purpose, using as reference for calculating electrical angle, a 5th terminal is only required to flow up to about 5 amp current from neutral connection. To be conservative, some utilities required a 5th terminal being designed for a 30 amp current by using #10 AWG wires. In multiple meter devices, a neutral bus connecting neutral feeder is commonly used to distribute neutral current through multiple meter sockets to their 5th terminals. There are also a few multiple meter devices using #10 AWG wires which connect directly from neutral feeder to all individual 5th terminals with a home run connection.
This invention improves on the deficiencies of the prior art and provides an inventive wire distributed 5th jaw system for multi-position metering.